Aftershock
by Okami Red
Summary: Late one night, Faye is haunted by the memories of a love that never was. Post-Bebop.


Yes, yes, I know. Faye angst has been done, but I couldn't resist. ^__^  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Cowboy Bebop or any of its wonderful characters. But I do own this rubber duckie! *squeak, squeak* Ain't it cute?   
  
Aftershock   
  
Ganymede's Hardin City. The neon and lights of the urban society reflected in the ever-widening pools of rainwater, the ripples of raindrops distorting the images into blurs of garish color. Whoops of drunks and a lot of cranked jukebox music blared from the bars. A car's burnout off the corner shrieked distantly, followed closely by the wail of police sirens. Adding to the noise, yet drowning it out was the rain. Its hushing, silvery sound on the window overpowered the rest of the ruckus, subtle though the little raindrops were.  
  
She sat on her apartment bed, a few locks of straight black hair hanging in her face. Lying on the cool sheets, she scanned absently over a newspaper, but the look in her eyes told obviously that she was elsewhere mentally.   
  
Why do people try to read, or watch television, or just walk around the house when things are wrong? Is it just a last resort to appear to be doing something normal,make it look like everything is okay, and make themselves think the same?  
  
She smiled ruefully as she thought of this aspect. And what was really wrong? What bitter truth was she avoiding?   
  
Spike.   
  
He never bore his heart open to anyone. Beneath the calm,devil-may-care exterior, Spike Spiegel was afraid to show anything to anyone after the incident of Julia. Come to think of it, she'd never seen him with a genuine smile on his face. Always a smirk,wether out of sarcasm or to reassure, but never a true smile out of simple happiness. It actually seemed sad, if you thought about it.  
  
  
  
It wouldv'e been really great if he'd have smiled genuinely, just once, at her. Faye was sure he must have had a beautiful smile.  
  
  
  
Faye sighed slightly and brushed her hair behind her ear with one finger. What was she saying? This was Spike Spiegel she was thinking about here. He'd always had a streak of nasty attitude she'd never liked. Aside from that, he was messy, smelled like he'd sat in an ashtray for a week, had a bachelor-type demeanor and way that tended to tick her off, and to top it off he'd had a horrible sense of hairstyles. What a jerk.  
  
Jerk yes, but the jerk Faye had and still did love.  
  
And now he was gone. Just like that.  
  
And the Bebop crew had dispersed to heaven-knows-where after his death. Jet and Faye had traveled about, bounty-hunting and struggling along for a few weeks...but that was exactly what caused them to break the ties and move on. Doing the day-to-day things aboard the Bebop just wasn't the same without Spike. In fact, it was agonizingly painful. So the two had said their goodbyes after a drink at a bar on some secluded colony on Jupiter, and went their separate ways.   
  
And that had been it.  
  
No more Spike.  
  
No more Bebop.  
  
No more...anything.  
  
This was wrong...it couldn't happen.  
  
But it had, and she had been and still was powerless to stop it.  
  
No....no!  
  
She bolted up and flung the newspaper on the bed furiously. "$#@&% you, Spike Spiegel, things wouldv'e been different if you hadn't died, you flying piece of bullcrap! Don't you care about Jet? And I pray to God that Ed dosen't know how you died, because you know it'd break her heart! You idiot, didn't you know what you had in friends like that?! Well, did you?!" Faye snarled at Spike's nonexistent presence as she dropped herself back down on the bed. "And the part I hate so much...." She paused, her raging emerald- green eyes softening with the tears that filled them. "...is that your'e....your'e breaking my heart,you idiot. Jerk...."   
  
Faye picked up the newspaper she'd flung down and clenched in a strangle-hold in her fist.  
  
"....you stupid, stupid jerk...."   
  
A small blur in the typing. The blur dripped and smeared down in a streak of black, bleeding onto the other letters. Faye touched the tear-stain, hardly realizing it was her own, and rubbed it further into the smeared ink.  
  
Her grip on the paper faltered, and the wrinkled roll fell to the floor with a soft crinkle.   
  
Finally, there was quiet, interrupted only by quiet, stifled sobs and backdropped by the rhythmic sound of rain on the window.   
  
---------  
  
MEMORIES LIKE GHOSTS...  
  
  
  
COWBOY BEBOP 


End file.
